Rollover *** (1981, Jane Fonda, Kris Kristofferson, Hume Cronyn, Josef Sommer, Bob Gunton, Jodi Long) – Classic Movie Review 6,957

Jane Fonda stars in the intelligent, upmarket 1981 romantic mystery thriller film Rollover, her third film for director Alan J Pakula, after her Oscar-winning Klute and Comes a Horseman. 

Jane Fonda stars in the 1981 romantic mystery drama Rollover, her third film for director Alan J Pakula, after her Oscar-winning Klute and Comes a Horseman.

Fonda plays Lee Winters, the former movie queen and wife of a murdered bank president who investigates high finance and romances banker Hubbel Smith (Kris Kristofferson), who appears to be trying to protect her from the bad guys. The question is, can they trust each other? It turns out that an Arab oil organization is plotting to wreck the world economy.

Rollover is an intelligent, upmarket romantic thriller with a fascinating, provocative finance background that does not quite have the popular touch and proved too highbrow to be a popular hit. It is true that auditing, financing, accounting, bookkeeping and corporate corruption are a hard sell, but if anyone could sell it in 1981 it was Pakula, Fonda and Kristofferson. It grossed a little more than $10 million at the US box office.

Pakula’s sleek, good-looking, lovingly crafted movie is stylishly played by a well-matched star pair and by Hume Cronyn as a conniving banker, Maxwell Emery.

Also in the cast are Josef Sommer, Bob Gunton, Jodi Long, Marvin Chatinover, Ron Frazier, Macon McCalman, Crocker Nevin and Martha Plimpton in her film debut.

Rollover is directed by Alan J Pakula, runs 117 minutes, is made by IPC Films and Orion, is released by Warner Bros, is written by David Shaber, Howard Kohn and David Weir, based on the story by David Shaber, is shot in Technicolor by Giuseppe Rotunno and William Garroni, is produced by Bruce Gilbert, is scored by Michael Small, and is designed by George Jenkins.

Rated suitable for 15 years and over.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 6,957

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com